Tomorrow we will celebrate. And eat food...lots of it!
Families will embrace time together.
We will open presents. And someone will inevitably wish he had sister's gift.
Today it's Christmas Eve. A time to anticipate the celebration of Christ's arrival as a baby. But I can't think of this night without thinking of the night before Jesus died.
The eve of Christ's birth was so different from the eve of his death, yet they were both integral elements of God's story on earth.
On the eve of Christ's birth, angels waited to herald the announcement of his arrival. On the eve of his death, the betrayer waited to deliver his traitorous kiss.
On that first Christmas eve, shepherds watched their sheep, not knowing they would soon kneel before their infant king. Homage to the king was coming.
Several decades later, on another evening, disciples watched their kneeling master wash their feet, not believing they would soon forsake him in fear. Desertion of the king was approaching.
On the eve of Jesus' birth, kingly gifts were en route to Bethlehem. On the eve of his death, a crown of thorns and a purple robe, gifts of mockery, were on the route to Golgotha.
One night anticipated birth. The other night sentenced death. One brought worship. The other betrayal. One seemed victorious. The other proclaimed failure. Yet the two eves are part of one story, a story of victorious redemption in death! A story of death bringing new life.
I delight in my deliverer's arrival on earth. I rejoice in his resurrection. But is my life consumed by - is it conformed to - his crucifixion?
I'm ready to celebrate! But am I just as willing to daily embrace his death in my life?
Celebrations are good. Remembering is good. But Christmas has become a commercialized holiday. It's much more about glitter and gifts and grand extravagance than it is about remembering the infant king who came to die to save the world.
Oh, we will celebrate! We will open gifts and eat lots of food. We will love time with family and stay up late. But, because Jesus is my Savior, celebrating his birth cannot be the climax of the party. True faith leads me to embrace his sufferings and be like him in his death, while rejoicing in the power of his resurrection.
Will I seek to crucify myself and take up my Savior's servitude on this Christmas Eve? In the midst of a celebration that tends to belong to Christ in name only, will I live in cruciformity, conforming my life to the image of the crucified Christ? Will I sacrifice and serve and love in humility?
Will I? Will my children? Will our family? I pray so. With all my heart.
"In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:
Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!"
Phil 2:5-8
"I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death."
Phil 3:10
"I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death."
Phil 3:10
*Cruciformity is not my own term! I borrowed it from the book Cruciformity: Paul's Narrative Spirituality of the Cross.
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